Podcasts are quickly becoming an important part of the presidential election, with Hillary Clinton launching her own podcast, called With Her. In the first episode of the show, which is hosted by Longform’s Max Linsky, Clinton talks about how she stays focused on the campaign trail.

Recode’s Too Embarrassed to Ask conscripted the Verge reporter Russell Brandom to look at what would happen if voting machines were hacked. While Brandom doesn’t think it’s particularly likely, he thinks it could be done. “You’re not hacking Bank of America, where someone has spent a lot of money to make sure that no one can get into that,” Brandom said. “I’m worried about voting machines just not working. I don’t know if it’s extremely likely, but the results would be so catastrophic to the body politic.”

The FiveThirtyEight Elections show explains why this is the perfect year for a third-party candidate, while On the Media explores what could happen if a viable third party ever took root in the US political landscape. They also examine how so-called strategic voting could shake things up in the coming election. Speaking of the upcoming election, the New York Times has launched its own election podcast called The Run-Up. Hosted by Michael Barbaro, the show, which will drop episodes twice a week, features interviews with New York Times reporters and columnists, as well as guests like Newt Gingrich and Donald Trump’s construction manager. As for Trump himself, on MTV’s The Stakes, Marcus Ellsworth wrote a lullaby for the baby Trump kicked out of his political rally.

If politics makes you want to change the channel, Song Exploder took a close look at the BoJack Horseman theme, which was created for the Netflix series by Patrick Carney, one half of the Black Keys, and his uncle, Ralph Carney, a multi-instrumentalist who has worked with artists such as Tom Waits, St Vincent, and Galaxie 500.

The Worst Bestsellers, the auditory book fair hosted by a librarian and a writer, opened up its collection of books by RL Stein, the teen-friendly horror master, including Goosebumps and Fear Street. Turns out they may not be as good as you remember. The Penumbra Podcast, a storytelling show that gives classic tales a head-spinning twist, released an entertaining intergalactic whodunit. Over on Harry Potter and the Sacred Text, a podcast that – as its name implies – treats JK Rowling’s fictions as if they were gospel, looks at the message of hope inside Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, including the so-called “sacred space of Quidditch”.

Inside Amy Schumer head writer Jessi Klein stopped by the Earwolf podcast Ronna and Beverly to chat about the joy of motherhood, the bigger joy of shaking Gwyneth Paltrow’s hand, and her new book You’ll Grow Out of It.

In other literary news, the rather fusty series Selected Shorts, which has famous people read short stories on air, has gotten a makeover for the podcast age. The new series, Welcome to Selected Shorts: Too Hot For Radio, is hosted by comedian Aparna Nancherla and seems determined to shake off any lingering dustballs. The show kicked things off with an intense take on the relationship between Batman and Robin by Stephen King, read by Avatar star Stephen Lang.

Politics for humans: a new podcast from Guardian US

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Speaking of odd takes on pop cultural phenomena, have you heard the one about Beyoncé holding Sia prisoner? Internet Explorer takes a deep dive into the Brazilian conspiracy theory and it’s definitely an eye-opening story. For its season finale, the Buzzfeed podcast also got legendary film-maker Werner Herzog to talk about the internet’s favorite movies – cat videos.

Another famous director stopped by podcast-land when so-called Sultan of Sleaze John Waters stopped by The Talkhouse for a chat with White Reindeer director Zach Clark. The entertaining and wide-ranging conversation covered everything from the time Waters met Justin Bieber to his mother’s reaction to seeing his first film, and his love-hate relationship with Terrence Malick’s movies. In other movie news, Dead Last Podcast was joined by comedian Owen Linders for a very in-depth discussion of the movie Predator.

Whether you’re waiting for a Predator showing, a cronut, a ramen burger, or a brunch reservation (or something non-food-related), Freakonomics looked at the psychology of standing in line.

The Guestlist got rapper – and once upon a time Secret Skin podcaster – Open Mike Eagle to talk about his own psychological profile and how he uses his educational background in his songwriting. Eat, Pray, Love author Elizabeth Gilbert’s podcast, Magic Lessons, asked comedian and How to Be Amazing podcaster Michael Ian Black to coach an up-and-coming improv comedy performer on how to create a compelling one-man show.